I believe that since they are claiming these are OEM copies, that means the don't come in a package or with any printed material or eve a box. They provide just the media, which presumably has the serial number printed right on the paper sleeve or the media itself. They should be able to just read it and email me the serial number, but I'm certainly not holding my breath while waiting for their reply.

Most of these "no name" businesses that have these store fronts on eBay, Amazon.com, Price Grabber, etc. could be one person working from their kitchen table for all you know. Amazon may have more stringent requirements on who they will let sell on their site but I doubt eBay and Price Grabber do. :-)

I love it when people don't understand why adobe doesn't give away it's 700 dollar software with a scanner that goes for 29.99. but the "oem resellers" don't even give you the scanner!!!

here's a tip for people who buy software that IS oem... one of the terms of the oem software is generally you need to sell it WITH the equiptment. so an "OEM version" of windows for example is generally only legal when sold WITH A COMPUTER.

I contacted Adobe chat. I chatted with two customer service representatives and both have informed me that my serial number is a legal/legit and that it not registered to anyone. On both occations, neither mentioned anything about it needing to be sold with a computer. Both times I asked whether I can use the serial number with the upgrade CD of CS4 and they told me that I could and I need not worry.
Also, my OEM CD came with manuals.

>That was a very old version of Premier Pro...There may well have been OEM versions of that back then

My understanding is that during the change from Premiere 6x to Premiere Pro 1 Adobe sold a bundled version (to Sony for Vaio?) that was called either Premiere Standard or Premiere 7 (I have seen both names used when people ask questions)

Every now and then someone drops into the Premiere 6x or "latest" Premiere CS forums... and they are directed to the Premiere Pro 1x forum for "close enough" answers

As far as I know, there were never any updates for that bundled version... I don't know if Adobe ever offered a discount to update to any later version

PS - I started with Premiere with version 6, which was bundled with a Pinnacle Dv500 analog to digital card... I later used that to upgrade to PPro 2 (don't remember the discounted price, but it was a good sized savings over regular retail)

Obviously there is much confusion and lots of "opinions" about this and I'll never understand why companies like Adobe cause this confusion in the first place, then don't apparently do something to clear it all up.

They can certainly read this and many other threads and respond if they wanted to. Either they have licensed legal OEM copies of CS3 in the past or they haven't. I suppose only they know for sure!

And then they wonder why people create crack versions of their software, even just one day after they release a new version.

Very frustrating for those that either can't afford or can't justify the full price for the latest version but would be willing to buy a legal copy of an older version for a reduced price. That seems like a legitimate and vibrant market segment to me.

That is about the time that Photoshop stopped being bundled. For one thing, scanners dropped from the $1500 I paid for my first one, to the under $250 range (and lower since). It no longer became worth it to scanner makers to include Photoshop in their package, even if the OEM fee was only $100 or so. (Actually, if you paid $200 extra, then the OEM fee was probably a bit higher). They wrote their own limited software, and let the users buy Photoshop or get something else when they discovered how limited the included software was.

Don this sounds plausible but are you really sure about CS3 being the right time-frame for OEM bundling to have stopped? I would have thought bundling because of scanner prices dropping would have occured a LONG time ago--more like Photohop version 6!

It would be so simple if Adobe would just state when they last licensed OEM copies in the U.S.

Did I say CS3? The OEM for Photoshop probably ended before version 5.5.

I don't think Adobe has to publicly address this issue. OEM has not been available for over 10 years, and this is well know by, at least, the regular users of these forums. Anyone claiming to be selling OEM since then is pirating.

OK, that does make much more sense and explains a lot. I'm now convinced there's not likely a legitimate OEM version of CS3 out there so I won't bother to pursue this.

Reading this thread and other online articles about piracy, I understand it's sometime nearly impossible to even recognize pirated software because of the sophisticated packing done by the more serious pirates.

That leaves me with the only logical conclusion--it's much safer to just download a cracked version of Adobe products where you know you can rely on getting a valid and fully working version and always be assured you have the latest version available.

OK, just kidding....just kidding...just kidding!

I guess I'll have to consider buying Adobe Photoshop Elements instead. I just wish the Adobe site had a clear comparison feature for feature of the differences between the two versions so it would be easier for me to decide (for example, I don't do any advanced color management or color profiling of my hardware and I know this is just one of the differences between the two versions).

Oh well...maybe I'll ask that on another thread.

Thanks everyone for your input and from keeping me from potentially wasting money and time with these pirated "OEM" versions.

Wow...that's thinking "outside the box" Dave. Nice. I'll have to check that out. Chicago is large enough to probably have very low-cost classes (much lower than the price difference I would bet) but I'll have to check the Adobe requirements to qualify. It just might be worth it not to mention fun!

Thanks again guys. I would bet you're right...quite a savings and I might actually learn something about Photoshop also (although I won't have any high expectations of that). Hey I don't actually have to attend classes after I register and pay right? :-)

Software licensing is such a complex subject, second only I'm sure to book publishing and music licensing! I'm surprised there aren't any software licensing "police" yet like the music industry has (ASCAP, BMI). :-)

Section 16.3:
Educational Software Product. If the Software is Educational Software Product (Software manufactured and distributed for use by only Educational End Users), you are not entitled to use the Software unless you qualify in your jurisdiction as an Educational End User.

That pretty much sums up that it can only be used for Educational purposes.. if you're using it in a commercial capacity, you aren't an Educational End User.. you're a commercial end user.. you may have qualified to BUY the Educational version, but that doesn't mean it can be used commercially.

I had a friend who bought Windows XP (to downgrade his Vista) from a private seller on Amazon. Yes, it was a counterfeit. I suggested he file a complaint through Amazon because even though it's a private seller, it is sold under the aegis of Amazon.

He has so filed. It's in process. I suggest that anybody stuck with such goods file a complaint. As to eBay, I bought an iPod for my daughter. It was perfectly functional but a Chinese rip off of Apples intellectual property which offended me. I demanded a return from the seller who refused. I filed through PayPal based ONLY that it violated Apples property rights - because it did work.

Wow...what an interesting story Paul. Thanks for sharing it with us. These are great ideas and I'm impressed that you did the right thing. I've personally vowed to try to absolutely avoid all Chinese imported food (toxic), all cheap dollar store items (99% imported from China and 98% non-functional or toxic) and really try hard to minimize valid purchases of made-in-China merchandise until they learn to control their illegal activities, reduce corruption and comply with international copyright and patent guidelines, not to mention free-up their currency so it floats freely with the other world currencies.

Sorry, didn't mean for this thread to become political but it's just not right how much that country gets away with and how much revenue they divert from U.S. companies with activities like these.

i've been impressed with paypal for a while now. i used them in their 1st incarnation, before being bought by ebay and got screwed over something like a 15 dollar purchase where the guy never shipped (and is STILL want the little jose cuervo bar game i won! :( :))

but fast forward 10 years or so and i needed something to pay for an overseas site i wanted to use ( http://www.letsplaychess.com ) without putting my credit card # overseas and paypal fit the bill. since then (about 2 years now) i have nothing but good things to say about them.

I really like their browser plugin and the auto generate a 1 time use only card.